Personal Narrative Of Travels To The Equinoctial Regions Of America During The Years 1799-1804 - Volume 2 - By Alexander Von Humboldt And Aime Bonpland.
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No Commercial
Advantage Is Here Made Of The Igua; But I Saw Vessels Arrive On The
Coast Of Terra Firma,
That came from Demerara laden with the fruit of
the Caryocar tomentosum, which is the Pekea tuberculosa of Aublet.
These
Trees reach a hundred feet in height, and present, by the beauty
of their corolla, and the multitude of their stamens, a magnificent
appearance. I should weary the reader by continuing the enumeration of
the vegetable wonders which these vast forests contain. Their variety
depends on the coexistence of such a great number of families in a
small space of ground, on the stimulating power of light and heat, and
on the perfect elaboration of the juices that circulate in these
gigantic plants.
We passed the night in a hut lately abandoned by an Indian family, who
had left behind them their fishing-tackle, pottery, nets made of the
petioles of palm-trees; in short, all that composes the household
furniture of that careless race of men, little attached to property. A
great store of mani (a mixture of the resin of the moronoboea and the
Amyris carana) was accumulated round the house. This is used by the
Indians here, as at Cayenne, to pitch their canoes, and fix the bony
spines of the ray at the points of their arrows. We found in the same
place jars filled with a vegetable milk, which serves as a varnish,
and is celebrated in the missions by the name of leche para pintar
(milk for painting). They coat with this viscous juice those articles
of furniture to which they wish to give a fine white colour. It
thickens by the contact of the air, without growing yellow, and it
appears singularly glossy. We have already mentioned that the
caoutchouc is the oily part, the butter of all vegetable milk. It is,
no doubt, a particular modification of caoutchouc that forms this
coagulum, this white and glossy skin, that seems as if covered with
copal varnish. If different colours could be given to this milky
varnish, a very expeditious method would be found of painting and
varnishing our carriages by one process. The more we study vegetable
chemistry in the torrid zone, the more we shall discover, in remote
spots, and half-prepared in the organs of plants, products which we
believe belong only to the animal kingdom, or which we obtain by
processes which are often tedious and difficult. Already we have found
the wax that coats the palm-tree of the Andes of Quindiu, the silk of
the palm-tree of Mocoa, the nourishing milk of the palo de vaca, the
butter-tree of Africa, and the caseous substances obtained from the
almost animalized sap of the Carica papaya. These discoveries will be
multiplied, when, as the political state of the world seems now to
indicate, European civilization shall flow in a great measure toward
the equinoctial regions of the New Continent.
The marshy tract between Javita and the embarcadero of Pimichin is
infested with great numbers of vipers. Before we took possession of
the deserted hut, the Indians killed two great mapanare serpents.* (*
This name is given in the Spanish colonies to very different species.
The Coluber mapanare of the province of Caracas has one hundred and
forty-two ventral plates, and thirty-eight double caudal scales. The
Coluber mapanare of the Rio Magdalena has two hundred and eight
ventral plates, and sixty-four double caudal scales.) These grow to
four or five feet long. They appeared to me to be the same species as
those I saw in the Rio Magdalena. This serpent is a beautiful animal,
but extremely venomous, white on the belly, and spotted with brown and
red on the back. As the inside of the hut was filled with grass, and
we were lying on the ground, there being no means of suspending our
hammocks, we were not without inquietude during the night. In the
morning a large viper was found on lifting the jaguar-skin upon which
one of our domestics had slept. The Indians say that these reptiles,
slow in their movements when they are not pursued, creep near a man
because they are fond of heat. In fact, on the banks of the Magdalena
a serpent entered the bed of one of our fellow-travellers, and
remained there a part of the night, without injuring him. Without
wishing to take up the defence of vipers and rattlesnakes, I believe
it may be affirmed that, if these venomous animals had such a
disposition for offence as is supposed, the human species would
certainly not have withstood their numbers in some parts of America;
for instance, on the banks of the Orinoco and the humid mountains of
Choco.
We embarked on the 8th of May at sunrise, after having carefully
examined the bottom of our canoe. It had become thinner, but had
received no crack in the portage. We reckoned that it would still bear
the voyage of three hundred leagues, which we had yet to perform, in
going down the Rio Negro, ascending the Cassiquiare, and redescending
the Orinoco as far as Angostura. The Pimichin, which is called a
rivulet (cano) is tolerably broad; but small trees that love the water
narrow the bed so much that there remains open a channel of only
fifteen or twenty toises. Next to the Rio Chagres this river is one of
the most celebrated in America for the number of its windings: it is
said to have eighty-five, which greatly lengthen it. They often form
right angles, and occur every two or three leagues. To determine the
difference of longitude between the landing-place and the point where
we were to enter the Rio Negro, I took by the compass the course of
the Cano Pimichin, and noted the time during which we followed the
same direction. The velocity of the current was only 2.4 feet in a
second; but our canoe made by rowing 4.6 feet.
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